


Holding Onto You

by MontyKarl



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Crying, Cuddling & Snuggling, Other, Platonic Cuddling, i may write more to this, this may turn into not platonic, tyler is so awkward, who knows - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-27
Updated: 2015-11-27
Packaged: 2018-05-03 16:08:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5297645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MontyKarl/pseuds/MontyKarl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tyler hires a professional cuddler, his name is Josh.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holding Onto You

Tyler stared at the webpage and he's kind of regretting his life choices right now. Mostly his life choice that he's on a website called snugglebuddies.com that lets you rent out a professional cuddler. It was a joke he thought, Mark had sent it to him the other day and laughed about it, yet here he was reading through the benefits of 'touch therapy'.

**List of Benefits**

  * Decreased stress and increased relaxation
  * Lessened depression
  * Lessened anxiety and social anxiety
  * Improved social skills
  * Improved self-esteem Improved sleep
  * Lowered blood pressure and heart rate
  * Pain relief



"Do you find yourself depressed at times? Do you ever feel lonely and wish that you could just talk to someone that would genuinely listen? Do you find yourself suffering from stress, anxiety, or sleep loss? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then you are not alone. Many people lack the companionship they want or need in their everyday life."

Tyler had never read something and felt more like it had been written about himself. He was working part time and going to college and was nearing graduation and trying to figure out what he was doing with his life. He was great at basketball but he was dabbling more and more with music. He knew his parents wouldn't like the idea of him leaving school for it, he didn't even love the idea himself.

However, he did like the idea that someone would come over and cuddle him without judgement. The prices were fairly steep but he'd had some money saved up from his parents and went to look through the list of professional cuddlers.

The female list was pretty extensive and most of the girls were quite beautiful and Tyler honestly felt so awkward trying to imagine himself intimately touching any of them regardless of it being platonic. Not to mention most of them were too far away to get to without spending more money than he had. He switched the tab to the male list just for fun and found only a few applicants. Honestly most of them seemed extremely creepy regardless of the strictly platonic rule that the website boasted and Tyler was about to give up this whole idea when one picture caught his eye. A guy with curly brown hair and gauges, his smile was bright and Tyler had to pull his eyes away to read his 'about me' section.

"Hi, I'm Josh and I'm from Columbus, Ohio. I’m interested in the outdoors, baking, writing, art, space, music, existentialism, documentaries, and alternative therapy. I believe that everyone needs time to decompress, and I’d be more than happy to help."

He was close by and something about his smile seemed genuine and calming and Tyler ended up clicking his profile to fill out a consultation form.

After he hit send he wanted to physically punch himself, but maybe this was a good thing. If this 'touch therapy' actually works the way it says, Tyler may have to get Mark a 'thank you' card.  
____________

A few days later and Tyler was setting up payment arrangements and giving his address to a complete stranger that was going to come to his apartment and cuddle him. He could afford two hours, but only paid for the one agreeing with Josh via e-mail that he could always add another if he wanted to. Josh had apparently only been a cuddler for a few months and hadn't had a male client yet, but was completely okay with it. Tyler tried to explain that he was just one of the closest options and didn't want to make things weird, Josh had insisted that it wasn't weird at all and somehow that made Tyler feel better. It was strange and he knew it, but Tyler himself was also strange, so he just kind of went with it.

Around 7 that evening there was a quiet knock at his door. Tyler was nervous and playing with a small piece of his hair as he opened the door to Josh. Josh stood there smiling, his eyes crinkling slightly, he was carrying a backpack and offered his hand to Tyler.

"Hi, I'm Josh, professional cuddler, you must be Tyler?" Tyler let go of his hair and shook Josh's hand. It was warm and solid and kind of bigger than his own and he felt small for a moment, realising he should respond.

"Yes uh yeah, I am...uhm so...how does this-I mean...." Tyler let Josh step inside and he sat his bag down, unzipping it to reveal a fuzzy looking blanket, a box of various teas and a book. Josh grabbed the book and offered it to Tyler.

"Well, we can go straight to cuddling; in which case, feel free to look through that and let me know if anything looks nice, " Tyler stared down at the book in his hands with 'Cuddle Sutra' scrawled on it, flipping through the pages of cartoon drawn people cuddling, "Or we can just sit and talk, play games, I give crappy massages but I'm down for that too, it's whatever you'd like."

"Uhm...I just.." Tyler looked at an expectant Josh, knowing his time was ticking down and looked back at the book and held it out to Josh on the page labelled 'classic spooning' and Tyler was blushing and he was paying a man to spoon him and honestly he wasn't sure how he should feel right now.

"Okay, that works for me. Anywhere you'd like to snuggle? Oh and am I the big or the little spoon here?"

"I figured, my uh...bed? I-I don't...the....I'd rather be the litt-tle spoon, if that's...alright?" Tyler swallowed hard, he wasn't so sure this was a good idea anymore, but the brief contact of Josh's hand as he came inside was more contact than he's had in a few months and he just wanted to see if this helps at all.

Josh nodded, "Lead the way then, do you mind if I change into something more comfortable?" Tyler had begun walking towards his room when saw that Josh had pulled a pair of sweats out of his bag and Tyler nodded and pointed him towards the bathroom. "Alright, cool, just go ahead and get comfy I'll be there in a minute.

Tyler himself was wearing a pair of basketball shorts and an old shirt he liked to sleep in because it was worn and soft. He set up his laptop to play a relaxation playlist he'd found on Spotify, hoping that it wasn't weird to play music. Tyler shifted on his sheets, feeling as restless as he did most nights, anxiety coursing in his chest, but then Josh was back and he crawled onto the bed like he owned the place, smiling lightly all the while.

Tyler tried to get himself to relax as he felt the warmth of another human press against him. "Lift your head a bit..." Josh mumbled and it was so close, and Tyler complied so that Josh could slide an arm under his neck and another arm came across his waist, soft breaths against the back of his neck. Tyler felt so safe, he felt himself sinking back against Josh's broad chest, a hand coming to rest over the one Josh had around his torso.

He didn't even realise he was crying until he'd made a small sad sound and Josh whispered, "Hey, it's okay...you can cry."

Tyler had no idea why he was crying, one of Josh's feet was kind of resting between Tyler's own and he was weaving their fingers together across Tyler's chest. Tyler felt his body shake with a sob and he squeezed his eyes shut tightly, trying to suppress his tears, but his body was pushing for the release. Josh moved his arm from around Tyler and gently started running it through Tyler's fluffy short hair, and Tyler just let himself cry until his pillow was wet and he knew his eyes were red and swollen, but he felt so nice right now.

  
A quiet timer chimed and Josh ran his fingers once more through Tyler's hair, fingers massaging his scalp and then the warmth was gone. Tyler almost felt himself start to cry again at the loss.

"Hey, it's been an hour and I kind of contractually have to go now...." Josh sounded sad as Tyler sat up and looked at him, his shoulders were hunched and he wasn't really smiling anymore.

"Okay..." Was all Tyler could say as he watched Josh shuffle off the bed and go change back into his jeans. Tyler threw cold water on his face in his kitchen as Josh did so, and was trying to think of something else to say as Josh came to pack his bag back up.

"Well, if you want to cuddle again sometime feel free to e-mail me, okay?" Josh said and smiled lightly, "Or like...if you want to call and just talk about anything we can set something like that up too."

Tyler nodded and watched Josh's hand grab the doorknob and begin his swift exit, the door shut quietly and Tyler felt his chest clench as he whispered, "Thank you..." to the empty room.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so this is based on a REAL website that you can actually go to and get a professional cuddler from okay.  
> I want to make this a series but I'm horrible at writing lately, but this may turn into maybe romance or something, but i'm really digging qp joshler right now....  
> let me know what y'all think here or @j-shler on tumblr


End file.
